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This beer's namesake is the folklore pirate Jose Gaspar. We are pretty sure pirates consumed rum and not porters, but this is marketing right?

Skimpy on the head and the lace barely stays; dark brown in color with chestnut highlights. Light enough in appearance to be confused with a brown ale. Sugary aroma with some brown sugar and a ghost-like burnt smell. The carbonation is at a medium level with a good all-around crispness and a slick moderate body. Sugary sweet malty flavor takes the taste buds hostage for a good while, and as soon as the sweetness lays off there is a watery burnt flavor with a subdued spicy hop bitterness. A little astringent husks come through. Hint of dried plum and brown sugar in the semisweet finish.

Not very balanced; aim for balance because it goes a long way. A very weak stab for a porter here as the overly sweet character takes this beer down. Don't be afraid of roasted malts and hops! We'll have to say to pass on this one, especially if you don't like overly sweet beers. (1,054 characters)

Poured a lovely deep amber in color with a fluffy tan head that lasts. Nice lacing. Aromas are very sweet, with some chocolate thrown in for good measure. Flavor is mostly malty sweetness, tempered by some cocoa powder. I agree with AKSP's possibility of some cherry in the flavor. Decent mouthfeel and drinkability. A respectable porter. (388 characters)

Pours a deep dark brown color that is almost black with a light tan head. Aroma is sweet and slightly nutty with notes of caramel, chocolate, molasses and coffee. Taste is sweet and malty upfront that finishes dry with a kind of nutty coffee flavor in the finish. This is actually a pretty good brew that I don't think I would buy again because there are so many better porters out there. However, I would not mind having again if given to me. (443 characters)

Pours with a fine off-white head over deep reddish-brown liquid. The nose has lots of coffee emanating upwards. The taste is dry, with some bittersweet chocolate flavors mixing with some slight coffee notes very nicely. Finishes malty and dryish, rich and mellow. A very well made ale.

Aroma: sweet caramal malts and estery yeast finish detectable. Mild to no hop nose.
Appearance: Surprisingly ruby red for a porter. I could read through it. Not black or opaque. The deep ruby is perhaps reminiscent of the style in the days of wood fired brown malt. The head is tan, retention is moderate.
Taste: ester sweetness is detectable, not overpowering or displeasurable. The sweet malt takes from stage, no roasted character though as I would expect for a porter. More of a complex brown ale flavor profile.
Mouthfeel: walks the street right down the middle the body is moderate and lends to a very smoith finish which carries that sweetness extremly well. Good match up of body to flavor delivery.

Overall this is very drinkable. However it drinks more like a Brown ale/belgian Duble fusion. Tasty brew to go with beef based soups. (847 characters)

Surprise! I thought this was Ybor Gold as in the All-Malt Lager. I didnt know it said Gaspars Porter, I was just looking at the neck label. Rookie. I poured this into a Pilsner glass

Brown-ruby in hue, clear, so this is supposed to be a Porter. Interesting. The liquid lacks color depth. Beige foam, at the apex the head was two fingers tall. Head retention was very good, the bubbles slowly faded to a half finger cap which hung around a bit. The subsequent lacing was organized but not very widespread. Overall, this is a decent looking beer.

Im smelling this a tickle colder than Id like. My bad. Still, I can clearly distinguish notes of chocolate, caramel candy, and kisses of earthy nuts. It is powdery and bitter at the back. Not very chatty, low potency, IMO, this beer has a weak nose for a Porter. I like what I smell but I want more of it. Inviting, nevertheless.

The palate offers some bitter chocolate, hints of dried candy caramel, some coffee essence way in the distance. I found sweet chocolate and brown ale-like maltiness in the middle with some earthy hops too; similar finish but a tad thinner. Low hop bitterness. Malty, sweetish aftertaste with a tickle of fruitiness. This sure seems like a Brown Ale to me. For a Porter this is not a very impressive beer. It does taste good if I ignore style. Decent.

Medium-light in body, watery mouthfeel, low carbonation, the body is too weak for me. The mouthfeel is not awful but its not very good either.

Well, this is easy to drink. I could drink a couple with cold cuts, rye bread, and spice mustard. The more I think about this beer the more bored I get. So I guess I should shut up and drink. Anyway, thank you Daniel for this bottle. I can finally cross FL from my beer state list. (1,792 characters)

Pour is a dark borwn, bordering on black. Some light off white foam settles to the top. Nutty smell - almost as if this is a brown ale. Small flavor - like a light porter. Little carbonation. Some choco flavor in there.

Light body makes it an easy drinker - but a far cry from the top porters out there. (345 characters)

Very little aroma what i could detect was like alcohol covered mildewed hay. Poured a rich dark brown that fell short of being black. Choclate and coffe taste is abundant. Actually tastes real good. Thin, but no thinner than Bert Grants in fact it is somewhat similar and that suprised me cause I really like Bert Grants even though it too is on the thin side.

Pretty nice flavorwise, but the mouthfeel is more like the "ale" it used to be named. (453 characters)

Appearance: Pours a reddish-brown color with perfect clarity. A light tan head starts around an inch deep and shrinks to a steady cap.

Smell: Aroma of toasted malt, bitter chocolate, lightly roasted coffee, and hops. Overall, the smell is a bit faint, as I really had to swirl the glass to detect anything.

Taste: Fairly rich and smooth with lots of toasted malt, chocolate, and coffee flavors. There's a nice hop character that balances the brew nicely, but the actual hop flavor is low key and in the background. Finishes with the balance slightly toward the hoppy end of the spectrum.

Mouthfeel: Dry and crisp, with a mouthfeel that is a bit too thin for me. I'd like to see a little more 'oomph' in the body.

Drinkability: Pretty good. I could drink this one on a somewhat regular basis, but I don't think it's quite good enough to become a regular of mine.

A 'thank you' goes to StevieW for including this in our trade! (939 characters)

A friend gave me this bottle. I think the label is sort of misleading because it says YBOR GOLD all over the place and only in the fine print it says Gaspar's Porter.

It pours deep ruby black with a tan, creamy head. Aroma is a basic one, of dark and/or toasted malts. The taste is not very strong. There's roasted character, chocolate, toffee, but it's all very toned down. Mouthfeel is creamy but a little thin for a porter. It's not terrible, I guess it's about as good as a porter made in Florida could be. Not the best example of the style, however. (557 characters)

12 oz. bottle. A winter seasonal from Ybor City Brewing in Tampa. It honors the Gasparilla festival in Tampa each February. Gasparilla was a pirate who lived in the area in the early 19th century. A beer named after a pirate, I like it already.
Murky brown pour. Rich foamy beige head. Lots of bubbles. Smell was a nice even combination of subtle chocolate and bitter coffee. You had to concentrate hard to get any noticable smells. Taste made up for it. Again chocolate malt in the background, some roasted coffee notes, not much. Nice sharp bitter bite to the finish. The flavors are there, but not as pronounced as some other porters.The coffee bitterness opens more as the beer sits a few minutes. Still they balance very well, and make for a very smooth porter. Medium to full bodied, nice feel. Stays solid to the end, no watery finish here, unlike the beer's namesake. Gasparilla's legend tells of him wrapping chains around his body and plunging into the Gulf of Mexico when facing arrest by the US Navy. (1,014 characters)

New formulation that lacks the Ybor Gold sub-brand. Gaspar's Porter pours out a ruddy brown color with a small mocha head. A sweet roast and milk chocolate rule the nose, it's a little sweeter than I tend to like. The taste brings a more well-rounded flavor - the aftertaste isn't nearly as cloying as I expected from the nose, a nice bitterness comes in instead. The mouthfeel is pretty good, it's got a nice enough mouthfeel and carbonation level, but neither are spot-on, and the drinkability is good. Overall, a solid porter from Florida Beer Company. (555 characters)